The Origins of Modern Human Behaviour Dating human occupations and reconstructing the palaeoenvironment in the Middle Stone Age, southern Cape, South Africa Christopher Henshilwood & Stein-Erik Lauritzen

SARChI Chair Institute for Human Evolution University of the Witwatersrand Johannesburg, South Africa Institute for Archaeology, History, Culture and Religion, University of Bergen

Institutt for geovitenskap Kvartærgeologi og paleoklima Universitetet i Bergen

• The principle objective of this joint South African (NRF) / Norwegian (NRC) proposal for 2007 - 2010 was • 1. To date the Blombos Cave Middle Stone Age deposits using the uranium series method • 2. To sample selected speleothems in De Hoop for palaeoenvironmental reconstruction and its effects on early H. sapiens behaviour

ORIGIN OF ALL HOMO SAPIENS IS IN AFRICA

200 000

SINGLE ORIGINS MODEL

Did H. sapiens have recognizably human minds before they left Africa at c. 60 000 years ? Or only when they got to Europe ?

A major research challenge in archaeology is identifying when and how symbols were used for the first time to mediate hominin behaviour.

The Middle Stone Age in Africa c. 300, 000 – 30,000 years With a focus on the Still Bay c. 77 000 – 59 000 years and earlier

Blombos Cave, southern Cape, South Africa

Blombos Cave

1992 - 2010

JOURNAL PUBLICATIONS 2007 - 2010 Peer-reviewed Journals •

In Press

1.

Mourre, V., Villa, P. & Henshilwood, C. (in press). Early Use of Pressure Flaking on Lithic Artifacts at Blombos Cave, South Africa. Science.

2. Faith, T. & Henshilwood, C.S. (submitted). Seasonal exploitation of neonate blue antelope (Hippotragus leucophaeus) during the Middle Stone Age at Blombos Cave, South Africa: implications for modern human origins. Journal of Human Evolution. 3. Henshilwood, C.S. & Lombard, M. (in press). Becoming human: Archaeology of the sub-Saharan Middle Stone Age. In: Bahn, P. & Renfrew, C. (eds.) Cambridge Encyclopaedia of Archaeology, Cambridge University Press. 4. Henshilwood, C. S. In press. The “Upper Palaeolithic” of southern Africa: the Still Bay and Howiesons Poort techno-traditions. In: African Genesis: Perspectives on hominid evolution (eds. S. Reynolds & A. Gallagher). Johannesburg: Wits University Press 5. Thompson, J. & Henshilwood, C. S. in press. Taphonomic analysis of the Middle Stone Age larger mammal faunal assemblage from Blombos Cave, southern Cape, South Africa. Journal of Human Evolution. 6. Henshilwood, C. S. & Dubreuil, B. in press. The Still Bay and Howiesons Poort, 77 - 59 ka: Perspective-taking and the evolution of the modern human mind during the African Middle Stone Age. Current Anthropology.

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Published

1. d’Errico, F., Vanhaeren, M., Henshilwood, C., Lawson, G., Maureille, B., Gambier, D., Tillier, A. Soressi, M & van Niekerk, K. 2009. From the origin of language to the diversification of languages: What can archaeology and palaeoanthropology say? In F. d'Errico & J.-M. Hombert (eds.), Becoming Eloquent: Advances in the emergence of language, human cognition, and modern cultures. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company: 13-68. 2. Henshilwood, C.S., d’ Errico, F. & Watts, I. 2009. Engraved ochres from the Middle Stone Age levels at Blombos Cave, South Africa. Journal of Human Evolution 57, 27-47. 3. Henshilwood, C.S. 2009. The origins of symbolism, spirituality & shamans: exploring Middle Stone Age material culture in South Africa. In Becoming human: innovation in prehistoric material and spiritual cultures, (eds. C. Renfrew & I. Morley), Cambridge, Cambridge University Press: 29-49. 4. Henshilwood, C.S. & Dubreuil, B. 2009. Reading the artefacts: Gleaning language skills from the Middle Stone Age in southern Africa. In: (eds. R. Botha & C. Knight), The Cradle of Language, Oxford: Oxford University Press: 41-60 . 5. Villa, P., Soressi, M., Henshilwood, C.S. & Mourre, V. 2009. The Still Bay points of Blombos Cave (South Africa). Journal of Archaeological Science 36 (2): 441-460. 6. Henshilwood, C.S. 2008. Winds of change: palaeoenvironments, material culture and human behaviour in the Late Pleistocene (c. 77 – 48 ka) in the Western Cape Province, South Africa. South African Archaeological Bulletin, Goodwin volume, Current Themes in Middle Stone Age Research 10: 35-51. 7. Henshilwood, C. S. 2008. Holocene prehistory of the southern Cape, South Africa: excavations at Blombos Cave and the Blombosfontein Nature Reserve. BAR S1860, Cambridge: Cambridge Monographs in African Archaeology 75: 1- 171. 8. Henshilwood, C.S. 2007. Fully symbolic sapiens behaviour: Innovation in the Middle Stone Age at Blombos Cave, South Africa. In: Rethinking the Human Revolution: New Behavioural and Biological Perspectives on the Origins and Dispersal of Modern Humans,. (eds.C. Stringer & P. Mellars), MacDonald Institute Research Monograph series: Cambridge, University of Cambridge Press: 123-132 1. 9. d’Errico, F. & Henshilwood, C.S. 2007. Additional evidence for bone technology in the southern African Middle Stone Age. Journal of Human Evolution 52:142-163.

International Invited Lectures 2008-2009 (selected sample) 1. Henshilwood, C. & Dubreuil, B. 2010. Language and Material Culture : Relating the Middle Stone Age in southern Africa to the origins of language. Summer Institute Conference ‘On the Origin of Language’ held at the Cognitive Science Institute, l’Université du Québec, Montréal, 21st - 30th June 2010. 2. Henshilwood, C.S. 2009. Continuity or discontinuity? Symbolically mediated behaviours in the Still Bay and Howiesons Poort Industries of southern Africa - and beyond. Invited lecture at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, 19th May, 2009. 3. d’Errico, F. & Henshilwood, C.S., F. 2009. Origins of symbolically mediated behavior. From antagonistic scenarios to a unified research strategy. Paper presented at the international conference “Homo symbolicus: the dawn of language, imagination, and spirituality” organised by Henshilwood & d’Errico and held at the Commodore hotel, Cape Town, 16 – 19th January 2009 4. Henshilwood, C.S. & d’Errico, F. 2009. Ochre as a media for symbolic expression during the Southern Africa Middle Stone Age: examining the evidence from the Western Cape, South Africa. Paper presented at the international conference “Homo symbolicus: the dawn of language, imagination, and spirituality” organised by Henshilwood & d’Errico and held at the Commodore hotel, Cape Town, 16 – 19th January 2009. 5. d'Errico, F. & Henshilwood, C. 2008. Les ocres gravées de Blombos Cave (Afrique du Sud) : découverte d'une tradition symbolique qui remonte à 140 00 BP. Représentations préhistoriques. Images du sens.Paris, Musée de l'Homme, Paris, 19-21 June, 2008. 6. Villa, P., Henshilwood, C. S. & Mourre, V. 2008. The Still Bay Points of Blombos Cave (South Africa). Paleoanthropology Society Conference, Vancouver, B.C., Canada: 25–26 March.

• POPULAR DISSEMINATION OF RESULTS •

Television 2008 - 2009 (selected sample)

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2009 – TV film made with Henshilwood at Blombos Cave for the Swedish Broadcasting Society Directed by Martin Widman and presented by Lasse Berg

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2008 - Film made at Cape Point Nature Reserve with Henshilwood on the ‘Origins of H. sapiens’ for Foster Brother Film Productions, South Africa.

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2008 - Film made at Blombos Cave with Henshilwood in March, 2008 for display in the ‘Anne & Bernard Spitzer Hall of Human Origins’, American Museum of Natural History, New York.

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2008- Film made at De Hoop Nature Reserve with Henshilwood directed by Alan Wilcox on Human Evolution in Africa. SABC Production.

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Web Sites

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http://www.svf.uib.no/sfu/blombos/

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http://web.wits.ac.za/Academic/Research/IHE/Archaeology/Blombos/Blombos+Cave.htm

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https://www.uib.no/ahkr/utdanning/arkeologi/the-cape-field-school-in-south-africa

Part 2: Reconstructing Middle Stone Age Palaeoenvironments through Stable Isotope analysis of Speleothems (calcites) Cape Town

Western Cape c. 250 km

Nature Reserve

Hermanus

Atlantic Ocean N

De Hoop

Arniston

Cape Agulhas

Blombos Cave

Indian Ocean

De Hoop Nature and Marine Reserve +-1500 sq. km

De Hoop Nature and Marine Reserve

Speleothems

Thesis Title RECONSTRUCTING PALAEOENVIRONMENTS DURING THE MIDDLE STONE AGE IN THE SOUTHERN CAPE, SOUTH AFRICA: STABLE ISOTOPE ANALYSIS OF SPELEOTHEMS FROM THE DE HOOP NATURE RESERVE JANE NOAH

Exchange Programme

Jane Sabina Noah A dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Science, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science Johannesburg, 2010

•Jane Noah spent 6 months at the University of Bergen Geosciences Laboratory analysing speleothems •Will be applying for a PhD stipend via UiB/Wits to continue speleothem research

RESULTS OF SPELEOTHEM STUDY This study provides several high-resolution chronologies for the southern Cape.

1. A discontinuous record of environmental change, dated from c. 3-50 ka comes from the Bloukrantz Cave 2. The stable isotope chronology from Kaisers Gat II is dated between c. 100-115 ka 3. Additionally, the results from this study contribute to a presently limited southern Cape terrestrial proxy database

Based on the results from this study, it appears that climatic change in the region was triggered by glacial-interglacial shifts related to the components of the ocean and atmospheric circulation, more specifically, the position of the Subtropical Convergence and changes in the Indian Ocean seawater temperatures. Location Cango Caves, Oudtshoorn

Time period (ka) c. 47 ka BP

Bar-Matthews et al. (2008, in press)

Crevice Cave, Pinnacle Point, Mossel Bay

90-53 ka

Vogel (2001)

Klasies River Mouth, Tsitsikamma

65.6 ka on calcite crust from the Howiesons Poort layers c. 100.8 -77.4 ka from MSA II c. 108.6 MSA II and underlying LBS layer

This study

De Hoop Nature Reserve, Overberg

c. 3.5-50 ka (with a hiatus from c. 45 ka)& c. 100-115 ka

Talma and Vogel (1992)

Blou1 and KG2.3 stable isotope records (Noah 2010)

Comparison between the Dome F δ18O record and the De Hoop isotope data from Blou1 and KG2.3.

PLANNED FUTURE CO-OPERATION 1.

To investigate early evidence for H. sapiens behaviour in southern Africa (MIS 6-3) at the Blombos Cave site and with new excavations at De Hoop Nature Reserve

2.

Using speleothems, palynology, marine cores and vlei sediments to investigate environmental conditions for MIS 6-3 (190 ka – 24 ka)

For the 1st time we will combine •

archaeological results

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original multi-proxy palaeoenvironmental data

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state-of-the-art climatic simulations

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a dedicated biocomputational algorithm will be applied to these results

TRACSYMBOLS Tracing the evolution of symbolically mediated behaviours within variable environments in Europe and southern Africa ERC ADVANCED GRANT 2010 - 2015

Christopher Henshilwood & Francesco d’Errico

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS •Jan Haakonsen •Tshegofatso Thoka •Tebogo Mokoma •Lise Frøseth •Robert Kriger